Actually, I think it's too bad. He was making a perfectly reasonable point about Barnett--it was scathing, but on target, with some nice details to back it up. But he couldn't let a chance pass him by to take an insinuating shot at Velleman, and then follow it up with irrelevant trashing of enemy Campos. Zero self-control.

So just going off of CV's. Leiter did his undergrad at Princeton, where Velleman did his PhD. Looks like they overlapped by one year. Then Letier did JD/PhD at Michigan, where Velleman taught before NYU. Schulz also went to Michigan, though I have no idea who he is. And then obviously Velleman has been a huge critic of the Leiter Report. For example: https://files.nyu.edu/dv26/public/Lighter/Lighter2.html.

In any case, I don't know what the current comment was about, but I can see BL/DV having a long and acrimonious history.

Sketchy version from a Michigan PhD who overlapped with Shulz is that Schulz was on the job market, Velleman accused him of somehow breaching the confidentiality of his dossier, and wrote to all the schools he applied with that accusation. Shulz complained to the Deans, who reprimanded Velleman, but by then it was too late, and he never got a job. It was assholish behavior by Velleman, though not really relevant in this context.

Okay, so this is how Brian is going to spread the rumor -- through 'sketchy' anonymous accusations. Every grad student at Michigan at the time -- at least, all who were ABD -- knew both how Schulz compromised the confidentiality of his dossier (in an act of monumental idiocy) and that the response came from the faculty as a whole, not merely from the placement director. Non-scandal at the time, non-scandal in retrospect. Nice try, Brian.

No, 2:46 is a former Michigan grad student who can't believe that I finally have first-hand knowledge of something in the philosophy gossipsphere. It's interesting to me. And I'm accordingly indulging my sense of outrage at the falsities in 1:13's comment. But you're right that it ought to be boring to others.

It's very easy these days, 8:10; you only have to send your electronic dossier to a friend at another institution through Interfolio. As long as the destination is not a hotmail or gmail address, Interfolio won't blink an eye. I believe, actually, that this is actually a pretty common tactic among job candidates. Having letters in your portfolio that you haven't vetted yourself is not wise, since so much of the rest of the game is a crapshoot.

Only the very old or the very naive expect letters to be confidential anymore, I expect. I've made my peace with that and no longer include details in my letters that I wouldn't want my students to read themselves.

i dont get it; how do you change the contents of your dossier? especially if it's getting mailed out straight from the department? like im going to break in to the filing cabinet--back in the day--put a forged letter into it and umm... hope nobody ever notices?

Well, first off, this hardly ever happens anymore. Interfolio has replaced the departmental staff and candidates have to pay to have dossiers sent (almost always via email).

I'm not sure how tampering with letters is possible even now, however, since letter writers directly upload letters and revised letters. But there is, of course, an advantage to violating confidentiality in letters. If, for example, a letter writer says something mildly negative about a candidate, the candidate could attempt to soften the impact by saying something in the cover letter. If the comment is more than mildly negative, the candidate should exclude that letter.

All of that said, I have not attempted to violate confidentiality. Perhaps as a result, still without a TT job after three years on the market.

Ignore 7:11. All of that stuff 'counts,' although not as much as journal articles. (Actually, with book chapters, that isn't as clear--it depends on the prestige of the journals and of the book press/editors.) But if you look at the CVs of research-active TT profs, you'll see that they regularly include all of those things, so the advice to omit them is badly misguided.

@717, of course they put them down; they're tenure track and have nothing to lose. job applicants have a lot more to lose--or at least not to gain. you're comparing apples and oranges. it's better to have a CV without weak stuff on it; you don't want the good stuff diluted.

11:03, I've been on multiple search committees for TT jobs, and people include that stuff, and nobody on the committee dings people for having that stuff. If they have only that sort of thing, then SC members might complain that a candidate seems to be spending too much of their time on peripheral projects in a way that is detracting from original research. But if things are on track as far as journal publications go, you don't lose credit by including book reviews and the like. That would be stupid. Doing reviews is part of the ordinary research activity of lots of professors, and showing that you're also doing book reviews alongside other activity is just fine.

And book chapters, if they're original research from reputable presses, also count as publications. Again, I would be a little worried if person had only publications of this sort, as you ought to be able to get papers out through the process of anonymous reviewing, as opposed to getting invitations for edited volumes. But if you have a good paper out in a volume from a good press, omitting that publication from your CV would be deeply stupid.

"it's better to have a CV without weak stuff on it; you don't want the good stuff diluted."

Are SC members so feeble-minded that they have trouble distinguishing the more substantive accomplishments from the less? Sometimes I wonder whether departments really should outsource the hiring process, since we continually hear about strategies for wowing such members. It doesn't take a lot of skill, however, to read a CV and figure out how strong a candidate is. Maybe philosophy professors are not able to read CVs well?

Since there is so much conflicting advice about how to handle relatively minor aspects of applying for jobs, it would be cool if people would calm the fuck down about it and reserve the super-confident pronouncements for things like whether to include headshots in your dossier. I know, it's a pipedream.

I tend to agree with 12:11 with one caveat: do not include publications in graduate or undergraduate journals. In contrast with book reviews, these are not, in the excellent wording of 12:11, "part of the ordinary research activity of lots of professors"; including them makes it look like you don't know this.

It's very endearing of you all to assume that search committees actually give a fuck about publication records when it comes to junior hires (let alone the fine details under discussion). Yes, I remember the days back in graduate school when I was idealistic like all of you. But you're in for quite a shock.

Typical philosopher blogger's trick: pretending that "does not imply" means "provides no evidence for". Apparently you missed the first day of Logic 101, when they explained that not all good arguments in natural language are deductively valid arguments.

Anyway, that's not the only reason. Try sitting on a search committee, or try looking at the hiring trends at departments of all kinds over the past few years (not just the top schools); once you've informed yourself, then get back to me.

i wonder what people think of the following: i'd rather hire someone with four articles in top journals than hire someone else with four articles in top journals and four weaker publications (as well). seems one thing that matters as much as quantity of publications is average quality; i dont disagree with the person up there who said to leave some of the lame stuff off. (of course people could disagree about what counts as lame stuff, but that doesn't undermine the general principle.)

I'll rephrase 2:22's claim, in a way I hope 2:22 will find agreeable: That some committees are sometimes willing to hire shiny new ABDs from tippy-top schools with zippo publications is not particularly good evidence (in the non-deductive sense) that "search committees don't give a fuck about publication records."

Anyway, I've sat on many search committees at my institution (a well-ranked R1 research institution). Yes, we have hired shiny new ABDs from tippy-top schools with zippo publications. But it would utterly false to say that we don't give a fuck about publication records. I do think it would be accurate to say that publications matter more the older the candidate's PhD is. For a new PhD or an ABD, it still matters, but it matters less than it would if your PhD is five years old. We frequently hire or short-list candidates in the latter position, but for such candidates a strong publication record is almost a necessity.

I agree with 8:05. Talking about whether it's wise to hire candidates "with publications" or "without them" is too course-grained, and doesn't take into account relevant distinctions between candidates.

One helpful rule of thumb I've heard (and used myself) goes like this: a five-year clock begins as soon as a young philosopher has begun PhD-level studies. After that clock runs out, assess research output as you would that of an assistant professor on a six- or seven-year tenure clock. Some examples will illustrate:

1. ABD candidate who is eight years into the PhD: expect publications equivalent to what an assistant professor would submit as part of her third year review.2. ABD candidate who is five years into the PhD: expect no publications, but strong promise of research output within the next three years (e.g., publishable papers already under review).3. Candidate who spent eight years on the PhD and four years in postdocs: expect publications equal (in quality and quantity) to a tenure file.

As for what kind of research output (in terms of both quality and quantity) that'd be expected of an assistant professor, that depends a great deal on the type of institution in question.

If more departments used your guidelines, 9:44, we wouldn't see so many unpublished ABDs getting jobs, especially candidates who have spent many years in grad school. This doesn't mean your "rule of thumb" is wrong, just that a lot of philosophers don't share your views about what kind of research output can be expected of job candidates.

Why would Barnett resign for what's effectively 1.5 years' salary? He's probably unemployable now, and gives up a university salary that would have paid for, say, 30 more years. I get that the legal fees are expensive, but it just seems he'd win; even if that costs 2 years' salary, he'd be up 26.5 years' all-in. In any case, I don't get the economic arguments I'm seeing some places. Maybe he's just risk averse or whatever, but I'd probably just sit at home, show up and teach my two classes, and see if the university could actually terminate me; I don't think they could. What am I missing?

Now there's another $80k thrown at some "loan forgiveness", maybe for a house. i don't think that was in original reports. (Still, the student got $850k or something, so this $290k Barnett gets doesn't seem very generous.)

I wonder, in cases like this, if there isn't just a desire to move on. I can well imagine having no desire to be part of that department any longer. Take the buyout as a means to do whatever job and/or career switching is wanted, and get away from that place. Not saying that that's the "right" thing to do, but it would be entirely understandable.

Total ownage on femphil: Kukla complains about wrestling-style conference poster without women and it turns out it was done by women and contains pictures of women.

That is the reason why I cannot take most philosophers seriously. They have the time to search the cyberspace for something they can bitch and moan about and then bitch and moan. Sorry, but where do these "scholars" get the time to do this? I expect them to work their fucking asses off. They have a fucking dream job, paid for research with very little teaching duties.

It is a great misunderstanding that so-called analytic philosophers are any less navel-gazing or infatuated with themselves than so-called continentals

also the same kukla who said that she liked to wrestle with the boys in philosophy and there is a great bit somewhere on the web where she and lance joke about "taking someone down" --high-5 Yo! -- don't have time to dig around for the reference but it was posted on the previous metablog

In answer to 3:35 pm: I gather that RK did not find the conference poster by searching cyberspace, but rather that it was sent to her by Barry Smith. You also expect these scholars to "work their fucking asses off." To address this issue, I looked at her CV and found two monographs, two edited collections, 37 journal articles, 15 book chapters, and numerous ancillary professional activities. You also claim that people like RK have "very little teaching duties." I do not know the teaching load at Georgetown, but I will note that she is currently the PhD adviser of five students, has advised numerous others, and has served on a large number of committees.

That said, the poster in question is sort of like a fart joke: puerile but not particularly offensive.

How is the enumeration of her articles any evidence to the contrary? Quantity does not equal quality. In fact most published work in philosophy is piss poor. But even if her work is good (which I cannot judge), one can still wonder how much more and better it could be if less time was invested in navel-gazing. DO you know how much Kripke has published?

For your info, Georgetown has certainly lighter teaching duties than most unranked non-research departments. And advising is not the same as teaching a course.

Why is it relevant to the gender politics of the poster that it was made by a woman? Genetic fallacy anyone? It's a stupid poster, and yeah philosophy would probably be a little better off it stopped thinking of itself as a kind of nerd combat sport.

I note that this is the same Rebecca Kukla whom Brian Leiter had as a guest blogger on several occasions. Since you guys are basically Leiter fanboys or sockpuppets, the trashing of her is a little unseemly.

I was addressing the implicit suggestion in 3:35 that maybe RK does not work hard enough. I take two monographs, two edited collections, 37 journal articles, 15 book chapters, and numerous ancillary professional activities to be evidence of hard work. I said nothing about quality. Perhaps you do not take two monographs, two edited collections, 37 journal articles, 15 book chapters, and numerous ancillary professional activities to be evidence of hard work.

As for advising PhD students, I have done enough of it to know that it is not the same as teaching the course: for any course x and any advisee y, x can be much much more work than y or x can be much much less work than y. It really depends on x and on y.

I have no special pro-RK or anti-RK axe to grind. But 3:35 insinuated that a particular philosopher X does not work hard enough. The evidence? X found something offensive which 3:35 guessed (falsely) X found by searching for offensive stuff online. The counterevidence? Two edited collections, 37 journal articles, 15 book chapters, and numerous ancillary professional activities to be evidence of hard work. I leave it to the reader to assess the evidence and the counterevidence.

Elizabeth Barnes wants to punch people in the face who disagree with her about disabilities and their value or disvalue. I wonder if she was the poster who, in previous incarnations of this blog, expressed similar violent fantasies about people who disagreed with him/her? Or maybe violent impulses like this are more common amongst philosophers than one would have otherwise hoped.

See this is what I miss about the good old PMMB days. Outrageous claims, people calling those claims out, and then some serious conversation in between -- all fueled by overly sensitive FPs who refuse to engage with critics in comment threads.

I like how, in closing the FP thread, the moderator said nothing productive was happening anymore. More like their own post was stupid, everyone called them out on it, and it was embarrassing to let people comment.

"Total ownage on femphil: Kukla complains about wrestling-style conference poster without women and it turns out it was done by women and contains pictures of women."

You're so full of shit. Kukla's actual comment: "“Um. Some one(s) thought this was funny but it seems super offensive to me. Philosophy conference as mostly naked mostly male combat sport with lots of chaotic fighting? Ugggghh."

By far the most outrageous claim in the thread is where one of the women involved with the poster says professional wrestling is "not hypersexualized." Uh... Some examples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ST7F46dNmMI

"An arbitration committee has upheld a recommendation by University of Saskatchewan president Peter MacKinnon to fire a math professor who rated and posted negative comments about faculty on the popular website RateMyProfessors.com."

Not plain stupid. There is a worry that such a blog post is a cynical attempt to present oneself as part of the suffering class. As someone who has had to deal with depression for the last 30 years this just comes across as a slight (and yes I know he says that he hasn't had a serious issue with depression - more reason for him to shut the fuck up)

Am I the only one who thinks that research into colonialism could take place in the history department where specific modules on those topics could be offered as an focus option in a history degree?

Sorry, but critical whiteness strikes me as the most bullshit, most offensive term for an academic field. Witness the destruction of philosophy as a "respectable" field. Only a matter of time when mainstream support will come to theses like logic is white, male and supremacist. Or "white vs oppressed minority metaphysics".

But now it is official: Lance the prance is the biggest idiot in the blogosphere. What an utter tool. The guy has serious issues.

Yes, such a program struck me as belonging to a history or some kind of cultural studies department. Philosophy shouldn't feel obligated to take any study relating to oppressed groups under its wing.

(I don't know what's going on, but the last couple phil of race talks I saw , while interesting, also struck me as having virtually nothing to with philosophy, the spirit of analytic philosophy, or the modes of inquiry associated with it. They were only philosophy in the broadest sense of the term and struck me as belonging in literature, political science, history, or psychology departments. There is plenty of phil. of race that is genuinely philosophy, so I don't understand why all this clearly-not-phil stuff is masquerading as it.)

What I find funny is that, given that Mr Coleman-Crossed is black and gay and that UCL has recently been hiring, is still unable to get a job there, despite his starred double first. His proposal must have been abysmally bad.

Thank you, 1:27pm, for so perfectly expressing the very attitude that makes it difficult for women and other minorities in philosophy.

Since UCL is under a bunch of pressure to hire blacks and gays, this black gay guy's proposal must have been *really fucking shitty*, otherwise it would have been approved. (Alternatively: Oh wait, this guy's MA proposal was approved? Well, obviously it's just because the guy is black and gay.) In no scenario does this guy succeed on his own merits.

How about this: Maybe the MA proposal wasn't approved because the program doesn't currently have the faculty to sustain it. This hypothesis has the virtue of being probably true AND not being deeply fucking offensive.

1:27 here! And I say it's because of the narrow proposal as Jonathan Wolff has claimed. Do you really think a department as left-leaning as UCL (or any other philosophy department in the world) would not take the chance of hiring a black (and most likely gay) lecturer? The whole community bemoans the fact that so few minorities enter philosophy (have you seen any black students in graduate classes, especially at high-ranking institutions?). If they had the chance to hire some, they would instantly do it. It is just that philosophy as a discipline does not attract many minorities for whatever reason.As for Mr Coleman, at least in terms of pedigree he is very attractive to any employer. But the fact that others have been hired is just a very strong indicator that those others are deemed better.

And given that philosophers tend to be hypersensitive when it comes to staking out victimhood - they do after all have no issues calling a module "critical whiteness", a term that is really offensive - it is very likely that his proposal was not good enough. And at some point very practical issues kick in.

One last point: It was Mr Coleman that made it about race first. Claiming that UCL is not ready to challenge white hegemony (or whatever bullshit language he used) because they did not approve his MA upon which a permanent hiring depended, leaves not much wiggle room to deny it.

I have a hard time believing someone as committed to left ideas as Wolff is against Mr Coleman, his MA or those ideas expressed and taught in it. He would not act against Mr Coleman nor would he sit on the sidelines if others did so.

According to Wolff, the original title of the M.A. was in "Dismantling The Master’s House". That alone should tell you a lot. I also suggest you take a look at his C.V., which is not one of a serious academic philosopher.

@1141. The phrase is a commonplace in certain social-justice-y writings. (I believe it originates with Lorde.) That said, I do think the title is inappropriate and suggests Coleman<strikethrough was just being provocative to be provocative. I just can't imagine academic students--or anyone really--even those into radical race theory would want to put "MA, Dismantling the Master's House" on a CV. If the student is an academic wanting to go onto a PhD in history, philosophy, or whatever, I can't imagine she will think to herself, "Wow, the committee is really going to like that MA!" First of all, no one will have much of a clue about what that means. It's not even clear that it's a race studies related MA, as I hear that phrase in certain kinds of social justice circles about non-race related identity politics. Second of all, because the title purposely doesn't explain how it fits into the broader academic world and won't tell any committees about whether or not the student has the requisite training to continue on to a phd program.

If the student is interested in non-academic pathways, perhaps in the government or a non profit working on improving race relations, again, I can't imagine anyone saying to herself, "Yes, this MA is going to make me look more legit." The title doesn't sound professional, or serious, or like genuine academic study. (Maybe the program would have been all these things, but the title is setting people up not to take it seriously.)

I don't know. It just strikes me as a case of someone who was trying to make a political point at the expense of doing something that would actually (a) improve the profile of race studies and (b) give future students the opportunity of studying race studies, in a way that could better advance the students' own professional goals.

Read what 7:05 AM. *Exactly* what I had in mind. This person is clearly less interested in (i) educating and benefiting his students and (ii) making race studies more compelling pursuit across academic boundaries...and more interested in being a provocateur.

Can someone please accuse someone else of a false flag operation? After all, it's summer break, and time to par-TAY.

BTW, professional blogs are stressful and maybe terrible. FP can be encouraging sometimes, and I've met some very helpful people there. LR scares me a little, but not that much. DN is doing a pretty decent job of posting content that will make us better teachers and researchers- and that's obviously good. Things got exciting in a stressful way last year at NA, but haven't checked back since.

I did a quick search of just his books, and he get over 3400 for 20 of them. I think he is closer to double that with papers. So, at least 6400 I would bet -- enough for the top 40. He lists his papers on his website and some of them have quite a few. It would be easy for him to create a page and open it up.

Since I can't seem to figure out the search features to make it easy, I am done.

The comment on DN from the OUP editor about why they published McGinn's last book is funny:

Why did you publish Colin McGinn’s book, The Meaning of Disgust? Did it go through ordinary peer review process? – Profx

Peter Ohlin (Oxford): Yes, it did go through the OUP peer review process. I know it’s not a popular book (or author) among some, but like every book that OUP publishes, it was peer reviewed by qualified reviewers, and then approved by the OUP board – known as the Delegates.

OK, well before I attempt to be more explicit, can you tell me your view on the following: Do these stories have any relevantly interesting differences, or do you think the failure of what you call "The New Consensus" to respond to the stories will be explained the same way for each of them?

Hmmm. I'm sure there are all sorts of relevantly interesting differences. I suspect the silence about both cases at FP, DN et al might have similar explanations. After all, there has been a pretty positive line on Title IX implementation up to now; and FP in particular gave quite a lot of space and at least implicit endorsement to extremely harsh criticism of the first Kipnis piece (I'm not taking a position here on how much of this was justified). So one might have thought that the NC would have something to say, both about the Harvard Law denunciation of title IX implementation, and about the latest developments in the Kipnis saga. Indeed, as regards the latter, FP posted a quote from Lauren Leydon-Hardy, framed by the factive (in this context) intentional verb 'explains', supporting the official complaints of the two NU grad students and clearly condemning the NU president for deeming Kipnis's first piece 'protected speech'. But this was April 6, well before Kipnis's (in the view of many, including me) shocking account of the content and handling of those complaints.

So I suppose it does look to me rather as though the silence in both cases might have a similar sort of explanation, and in fact one that is in a way heartening: viz a dawning realisation that things in both cases have gotten completely out of control and to continue with the applause might prove an embarrassing hostage to the not-too-distant future. (In my rare, wildly optimistic moods I even allow myself to wonder whether FP might have learnt something from the 'incredibly complicated' credibility massacre.) But it would be more heartening if there were some acknowledgement that some aspects of Title IX implementation are starting to look catastrophic, or that the complaints against Kipnis, initially cheered on at FP, have turned out to be, as 6.47 put it (S Tremain look away now!), 'insane'.

So I wasn't alleging 'politically motivated suppression of dissent' or a 'crazy witch hunt by crazed people', which is why I was confused by these comments, especially 11.25. But do you think it's fanciful to posit some such parallel between the sudden silences in the two cases?

But perhaps I have spoken too soon. J Dowell's FB 'PSA' (see below, 9.21) has garnered 18 'likes' in 3 hours, 6 from FP contributors or regular, sympathetic commentators. Comments are overwhelmingly positive. According to J Lackey, '[A]nother serious question that we all should be asking is whether her most recent piece in The Chronicle is an overt case of retaliation.'

A couple of commenters (including a FP contributor) have said things to the effect that on balance Kipnis should probably have been permitted to write at the the second piece, although there's a lot of emphasis in these comments too about how 'repugnant' etc her articles are. J Stanley is being pretty liberal with his 'likes'. (I'm assuming it's OK to report all this since the 'PSA' and presumably its comments have been deliberately made available to all FB users.)

I think that's right, 10.44. I mentioned the second piece in particular because the idea that it should have been suppressed seems to me particularly awful -- among other things, a straight continuation of the treatment she describes in it.

It's worth noting that a lot of the acknowledgement of Kipnis's free speech rights is not only grudging but also tentative: it's all so complicated etc. (No-one has yet said it's 'incredibly complicated', however.)

OP on FB says Kipnis has stolen the women's story. Others around here may think that the so-called New Consensus has stolen the women's story, exploiting it, because bonding and career advancement. Could there be any other suspects who might have stolen the women's story and exploited the weaknesses in Title IX's implementation? Or have we counted them all?

"I think another serious question that we all should be asking is whether her most recent piece in The Chronicle is an overt case of retaliation. In response to open Title IX complaints that were being investigated, where all parties involved are repeatedly told to keep the details confidential, she takes to the Chronicle to present a distorted picture of events, to speculate about the job prospects of the complainants, and to set in motion a series of online attacks on graduate students at her institution."

So, when the enormous machinery of institutionally funded secret tribunals is crushing you, publicly describing what is happening, without naming any names, is "retaliation"? So, regardless of whatever oppressive, opaque, Soviet-like investigations that one is being forced to endure, which could easily personally bankrupt someone attempting to pay for legal defense, speaking out, again, without naming names, is "retaliation"? Also, I wonder what Lackey thinks about the Columbia mattress girl. From what I understand, she broke the confidentially requirements quite flagrantly. Does Lackey think whether she unjustly retaliated is a "serious question that we all should be asking"?

It's absurd to suggest we all consider whether it might or might not be retaliation. It depends on what she had in mind. Retaliation requires intent. (And it's pretty clear that what she had in mind was to tell everyone in careful relatively neutral terms about what 2:27 describes as the "oppressive, opaque, Soviet-like investigations" she is enduring and told to endure without a lawyer. This might be her only way to be safe. Yet the discussion on FB makes it sound as if establishing her retaliatory intent requires only that a harm be proved (and then the harm is characterized as the fact of telling the assault victims' stories).

Well I agree that there really is harm to someone when you presume to tell their story for them if you do that in a way that closes them off or shuts them down. However, I don't think that's what Kipnis did at all.

Sometimes, it's best to ignore the lunies. It's partly our responsibility, however, to make sure these lunies don't get to positions of power. Therefore, whenever you're on a hiring committee, make sure to ask the candidate about her feminist persuasion. Better to raise flags early on in the process. And posting on the FP blog -- which, by the way, I've stopped reading as I don't want my mind to be contaminated -- should mean immediate rejection.

"It's partly our responsibility, however, to make sure these lunies don't get to positions of power."

I think part of the problem about all this weirdness around Title IX that we are seeing is due to power-mongering in the first place and I happen to think that there is another way for people to exist happily together than by battling over power and dominance. So, I'm not so sure about your suggestion insofar as it promotes an attitude that characterizes the "lunies' in the first place imho, if we are thinking about the same set of examples. Also, if someone goes about "raising flags" they may accidentally label people who are feminists but not power-mongerers or willing to give up every other kind of value for any advantage. I presume you are not against every feminist, is that right?

12.14: I'm pretty sure 11.32's comment was a rather leaden attempt at irony. The assumption seems to be that anyone who thinks that Kipnis is being targeted by 'lunies' would also want to prevent any feminist from getting a job in philosophy and would want to avoid reading FP for fear of contaminating their mind.

It's not irony and that's not the implication, 12:46. I think people who are saying that we should allow feminists in positions of power don't realize today's feminism's extremism. Today's feminists propound implicitly in their actions and ideas the idea that women are more equal than men and along with that go all kinds of injustices like due-process violations, vigilante justice, and lower standards of evidence for violations against university policy. We lose both freedom of speech as well as informal freedoms such as dating students we like, or even mentoring them as closely as McGinn heroically did. Also I'm not saying feminists can't hold any positions in philosophy, but we shouldn't allow them to teach any classes or rise to the rank of professor because that would involve power over students and colleagues as well, even apart from lending undue credibility to their beliefs.

It's frankly hard for me to shake the suspicion that you're some kind of agent provocateur, 1.14.

But taking your comment at face value for a moment, feminism is clearly still a highly contested term -- Kipnis herself is very insistent about being a feminist, for example, and she has ideological allegiances that bear that out. The idea that feminism in se stands opposed to eg due process is nuts, and your characterisation of 'today's feminists' more generally is without foundation. The apologists for the treatment of Kipnis she describes in her second CHE piece are (I think) a pretty small minority of self-identifying feminists even within philosophy. I consider myself a feminist in a non-trivial sense and I think it's far too soon to cede the term to the enemy. Furthermore, on ancestors of this blog I had some of the most rewarding online discussions I have ever had with people who not only identified as feminists but were defending, at least provisionally, various FP pronouncements I had denounced as beyond the pale. They were clearly interested in following the argument even if it conflicted with their prior ideological commitments.

I guess they must have been grad students. I virtually never see that on FP itself.

"A week or so earlier, the investigators had phoned to let me know that a "mediated resolution" was possible in my case if I wished to pursue that option....The students were willing to drop their complaints in exchange for a public apology from me, the investigators said. I tried to stifle a laugh. I asked if that was all. No, they also wanted me to agree not to write about the case."

Holy shit. The PC Left needs to get on the right side of history on this. They are like infantile adolescents playing with fire.

Janice Dowell has a public post on Facebook about this second Kipnis article:

Extremely important PSA: Think of the most traumatic event in your life. I'll wager that, like most people, there are very few people who you've been willing to discuss this event with. Discussing personal trauma involves reliving it. It is unbearably painful. It is also incredibly risky--the sharing of trauma gives the person with that knowledge the power to reopen its wounds. Now that you've thought about it, I'll wager, you'll realize that you have a sense of 'ownership' of this traumatic story. It is deeply personal, part of who your are, and it is YOURS to tell--or not tell.Why am I bringing this up? I'm reacting to some of the favorable responses to Laura Kipnis's article in the Chronicle about her "Title IX 'Inquisition'". This article, and her earlier one, are gross distortions of what is actually taking place at Northwestern and about the grounds for complaint against her. Kipnis here has placed her own wager--that because the sharing of one's own traumatic life events is extremely painful, because sharing them involves reliving them and giving others the power to reopen wounds--the very people best positioned to correct her distortions, the victims of trauma, won't do so. If we accept Kipnis's account without knowing the full story, we are adding greatly to the price she has already exacted from victims for their privacy. Perhaps you think I am wrong to assume that there are any genuine victims of trauma here. Doesn't this assume, you might ask, that Kipnis is wrong, something we can't be sure about, given what we know? Let us focus on that--our epistemic position. When we do, we'll notice that we have good reasons to think that we do not really know what the full story is here. This is a decisive epistemic reason to, at the very least, withhold judgment about the merits of the complaint against her. But there's a moral reason as well: There might be victims here, for all we know. If there are and we support Kipnis based on her own accounting alone, we are adding to the price they must pay to own their own story. This is a risk we should be careful to avoid.I have set this post to "public". Please share widely.

What the fuck is this person talking about? Kipnis' articles are "gross distortions"? Huh? Kipnis referenced what is public information about the Ludlow case, right? Anything other than that? Is this person saying that Kipnis' account of the what Northwestern is putting her though is false?

Correction (3/3/2015, 2:40 p.m.): This article originally stated that several lawsuits brought by a student at Northwestern University had been thrown out of court. Only one such suit was thrown out. The article has been updated to reflect this correction.

Clarification (3/30/2015, 10:45 a.m.): This article originally stated that a philosophy professor at Northwestern University sued, among others, a former graduate student of his whom he had previously dated. It would be more accurate to say that he had dated her according to his complaint. The article has been updated to reflect this clarification.

Whatever else one thinks of the PSA, this looks like a straight smear:

Kipnis here has placed her own wager--that because the sharing of one's own traumatic life events is extremely painful, because sharing them involves reliving them and giving others the power to reopen wounds--the very people best positioned to correct her distortions, the victims of trauma, won't do so.

J Dowell provides no evidence at all that Kipnis has somehow calculated she will 'get away with it' precisely because the traumatised people will be too traumatised to take issue with what she says. Her allegation also looks inconsistent with her claim that agnosticism is the only rational position with respect to whether anyone has been traumatised at all.

Besides, isn't this the question she should be pressing? 'Think of the most traumatic event in your life. Do you think that all other people should be punitively prevented by a third party -- say, their employer -- from publicly discussing this event in any way you might find re-traumatising?'

Hells no. And the most traumatic event in my life was pretty freaking traumatising.

Justin's source at Northwestern most likely also blogs regularly at FP under the name "philodaria", writes articles for the Huffington Post (though not about the Kipnis situation), and was the graduate student who brought Title IX charges against Kipnis who had "nothing whatsoever to do with the essay".

OP here----I also might be able to guess who the source is, but also think it is in bad taste to put such identifying info up here. I just think that the idea that we should take Justin's info as reliable is a bit wacky, since *likely*, his info is being filtered by the same crazy and paranoid people who filed the original complaint.

Agreed on both points, 8:31. I give both Kipnis' and Weinberg's testimony some evidential weight, but not a whole lot in either case. They've both said things others allege to be (and that certainly seem to be) false. I'll withhold judgement on the merits of the cases until more info becomes publicly available, an epistemic policy that is sure to piss off everyone involved!

Lawsuits and Title IX complaints and formal procedures oh my -- all, it seems, about fee-fees that got hurt (fancy names for this are "trauma" or "libel"). Have philosophers always been so litigious and sensitive? I really don't understand what is happening to our little corner of the academic world.

Let's pause over the macabre fact that Jezebel's take on the Kipnis situation is moderate and sane while the furies at the philosophy blogs are tying themselves into knots trying to justify their moral and social perversity.

And look at JS's response. Never forget that the banner at FP reads 'news feminist philosophers can use'. They're an ideological backwater more entertaining than anything else, though it will be interesting to see how fora like that are read by future historiographers.

When will this blog be abruptly shut down along with us being told that virtually every comment critical of the New Consensus was written by the same person? Is that coming soon? I need to prepare for the next wave of alienation.

Well, whether it's all one person or not I'm glad to see more critical discussion. And at any rate I find it hard to believe there's only one person here (at least, I know that you and I are distinct).